GREEN WALLS and FIRE PROTECTION IN LONDON

London promotes greening roofs and walls :

have a look at this official document:

A fine example of greening - the fire wall of Rubens Hotel:

...and what about fire protection ?

have a look at this official document:

The main factors to be considered in terms of fire risk would be:
• how hard it is to ignite the organic material?
• what is the likelihood and speed of fire spread through the organic
material?
• what is the likelihood, speed and consequences of fire spread back
into the building?

The main fire risk is considered to be concerned with the growing medium itself
rather than the plants therefore this project does not consider green wall systems
where the growing layer is at ground level.

No ignition
was observed to have occurred in any of the tests and there were no signs of
possible ignition, therefore the reactions were considered as non-flaming.
It is therefore unlikely that the growing medium will ignite or contribute to
flame spread, even when completely dried out.

The growing medium used in living walls cannot be ignited,
even when completely dried out.

The materials used to make up the living wall structures can be ignited and the heat
release from three of the samples was greater than 350kW.